Line #46 Main/KidsLoveDinosaurs


1	[[quoteright:350: [[WesternAnimation/HarryAndHisBucketFullOfDinosaurs https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/663494c0bbe9f99b04e010edc3a8e4786275bb44.jpg]]]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:That's a kid's literal bucket list of dinosaur friends, mind you.]]
3
4	TruthInTelevision. There is something of an idea that dinosaurs are kiddie, or that dinosaur products and fiction should solely be aimed at children (especially young boys).
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6	One reason this trope exists is that dinosaurs are a lot like fairy tale creatures, particularly [[DinosaursAreDragons dragons]]. Also, as they don't exist anymore ([[ScienceMarchesOn yes, we know...]]), you need a lot of imagination to reconstruct how they lived, and children use their imagination much more than adults. Dinosaur toys and media are often aimed at boys due to stereotypes and gender roles that boys like "cool things" while girls like "cute things" (which dinosaurs usually aren't seen as, though feathered and baby dinosaurs are often seen as cute).
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8	Sometimes, paleontologists will describe themselves as people who never "grew out of" their dinosaur phase. As a result, adults who still like dinosaurs can be stereotyped as {{Manchild}}ren. Compare BoysLikeCreepyCritters, AllGirlsLikePonies, PrincessPhase.
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10	----
11	!!Examples:
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13	[[foldercontrol]]
14
15	[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
16	* There are three things that Akito of ''Manga/{{Kodocha}}'' likes: [[TrademarkFavoriteFood Sushi]], [[ShipTease Sana]], and dinosaurs. "Like" is his way of saying "love".
17	* Likely why almost all of the partner ''Franchise/{{Digimon}}'' of the lead character in the ''Digimon'' series always resembles a T. Rex, to appeal to the target demographic of young boys. Special mention goes to [[Anime/DigimonTamers Guilmon]], who in-universe was created by a human child, and Agumon, who is the SeriesMascot for the entire franchise.
18	* In ''Manga/NegimaMagisterNegiMagi'', Negi is a serious and mature little boy who holds down a job as a teacher. When offered a time machine he immediately [[InnocentProdigy regressed to his proper emotional age]] at the thought of going back in time to see dinosaurs.
19	* Although not exactly a kid, RoyalBrat King Dedede in the episode "Fossil Fools: Part 1" of ''Anime/KirbyRightBackAtYa'' gains an interest in dinosaurs after a surprising find at the local dig site.
20	* The main cast of ''Manga/{{Doraemon}}'', consisting of four human children and a robotic cat, always get excited whenever they encounter dinosaurs in their adventures.
21	%%* ''Anime/DinosaurKing''.
22	[[/folder]]
23
24	[[folder:Comic Strips]]
25	* Calvin of ''ComicStrip/CalvinAndHobbes'' involves dinosaurs in many of his fantasies and daydreams, doodles them during class, and is keen to study them unlike almost any other subject.
26	* Jason of ''ComicStrip/FoxTrot'' is a huge dinosaur fanatic that he once messaged the White House to encourage dinosaur cloning.
27	[[/folder]]
28
29	[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
30	* Aaron from ''WesternAnimation/TheMitchellsVsTheMachines'' is an [[ExaggeratedTrope exaggeration]] of the trope. He's the youngest member of the Mitchell family and he's massively obsessed with dinosaurs; his EstablishingCharacterMoment shows him calling every number in the phone book just to find someone to talk about dinosaurs with. His phone case, his bedroom, and the t-shirt he wears are all dinosaur-themed, and he's extremely distressed when the family goes to a dinosaur-themed tourist trap and he sees how inaccurate the dinosaur statues are.
31	** His neighbor, Abby Posey, is a more normal version. While not obsessed, she is still shown to really like dinosaurs, as shown when the families find each the same tourist trap. When she meets Aaron she mentions how "these should have feathers" and offers him a dinosaur pencil topper like the one she just got, which causes him to develop a ''huge'' crush on her.
32	* In ''WesternAnimation/TheSecretLifeOfPets2'', Katie and Chuck's toddler son Liam has dinosaur toys in his room.
33	* ''WesternAnimation/ToyStory1'' has Mister Potato Head play the role of One-Eyed Bart, robbing the town bank, aided by Slinky Dog as his force field dog. Fortunately, Sheriff Woody has a coup fourre at hand with Rex, as a force field dog-eating dinosaur. This is all in Andy's playtime scenario, yet his Tyrannosaurus Rex plays TheLancer to Woody's TheHero.
34	* In ''WesternAnimation/WereBackADinosaursStory'', four dinosaurs are brought to modern times and "nicefied" by [[UpliftedAnimal making them intelligent enough]] to be displayed in a museum where kids would be able to meet and play with them, as [[BigGood Captain Neweyes]]' Wish Radio revealed that it is the dream of a lot of kids to meet real life dinosaurs. Later, they are hiding in plain sight in a [[UsefulNotes/MacysThanksgivingDayParade giant parade]] and start a musical number, with all the children singing and dancing. When they are discovered, all the adults start to freak out, but the kids are mostly in awe. But then even later, the trope is subverted by [[BigBad Professor Screweyes]], who [[DevolutionDevice devolves]] them to their former feral selves to put them in his CircusOfFear because his ''Fright'' Radio revealed that a lot of kids have nightmares about monsters, aka ''scary'' dinosaurs.
35	[[/folder]]
36
37	[[folder:Films -- Live Action]]
38	* In ''Film/Godzilla2014'', Ford's son, Sam, loves dinosaurs, having a bunch of toy figurines. Upon seeing Godzilla on the news, he excitedly tells his mother "Mommy, look! Dinosaur!", [[ChildrenAreInnocent unaware of the destruction Godzilla's presence is bringing]].
39	* ''Franchise/JurassicPark'':
40	** ''Film/JurassicPark1993'': Tim (the younger of the two kids being given a tour of the park) loves dinosaurs and continuously pesters Dr. Grant with questions about them. Likewise, when Grant sees a ''Triceratops'' for the first time, he reacts with an adorable, childlike awe, soon admitting ''Triceratops'' was his favorite dinosaur as a little boy. Subverted by the park itself, which was created to appeal to everyone, but John Hammond certainly admits that kids in particular will probably love it.
41	** ''Film/JurassicWorld'': Gray (the younger of the two Mitchell brothers) is obsessed with dinosaurs and cannot hold in his excitement upon visiting the park. Once again, the park itself is a subversion as it meant to be appeal to people of all ages.
42	[[/folder]]
43
44	[[folder:Literature]]
45	* ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}'': In the ''Megamorphs'' novel ''[[Recap/AnimorphsInTheTimeOfDinosaurs In the Time of Dinosaurs]]'', Tobias (a teenager trapped in the body of a hawk) reveals that he loved playing with dinosaurs when he was younger. His knowledge turns out to be helpful when he and Rachel are inadvertently separated from the rest of the group.
46	* The classic children's book ''Literature/DannyAndTheDinosaur'' by Syd Hoff features a boy named Danny who encounters a living dinosaur in a museum. The book revolves around their relationship and activities together. And yes, the dinosaur's name is [[ADogNamedDog Dinosaur]].
47	* In the children's book ''It Hurts When I Poop'', Ryan is a little boy of about three who loves to play with pretend dinosaurs.
48	* In ''Literature/JurassicPark1990'', Alan Grant loves kids because they share his enthusiasm for dinosaurs, which is rare in adults outside of paleontology circles.
49	* ''Literature/RoysBedoys'':
50	** Roys is sometimes seen playing with toy dinosaurs, and in “Learn to Share, Roys Bedoys!”, he draws a dinosaur.
51	** Loys also sometimes plays with toy dinosaurs.
52	** In “We Have Guests, Roys Bedoys!”, Hopper wants to play with Roys’s toy T-Rex.
53	* The protagonist of ''Literature/TickTockYoureDead'' early on complains about how he's bored out of his mind due to his family spending a whole day in the Museum of Natural History for their New York trip where he's forced to babysit his [[AnnoyingYoungerSibling annoying kid brother]], but "at least the dinosaur exhibits make it tolerable".
54	* ''Literature/AngelaNicely'': In “Cupcake Wars!”, when Miss Darling asks the class what they want for the fair, the twins suggest a dinosaur stall.
55	[[/folder]]
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57	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
58	* ''Series/BarneyAndFriends'' features the titular purple ''UsefulNotes/TyrannosaurusRex'' and his dinosaur friends befriending, playing with, and teaching a group of enthusiastic children.
59	* Attempts to be invoked in the ''Series/ICarly'' episode "iCarly Saves TV'' when Carly, Sam, and Freddie are approached by a TV producer who wants to turn their web show into a TV show. The cast enjoys it at first, until the producer starts making changes that get more and more ridiculous and stupid, one being including a talking dinosaur named Zeebo because "kids love dinosaurs." Carly and Sam quickly get annoyed with Zeebo's behavior, with Sam eventually beating him up.
60	* ''Series/DinoDan'' is a kids educational show about a young boy named Dan who is obsessed with dinosaurs, who's the only one who can see them.
61	* In ''Series/JustShootMe'', Maya falls in love with a dim-witted male model, whose immaturity is shown by his love of dinosaurs (which he learned about in a restaurant place mat).
62	* At the end of the ''Series/QuantumLeap'' episode "Another Mother", while Sam is waiting to leap out, Al entertains Teresa (who can see Al because she's five years old) with holographic projections of dinosaurs. Teresa is able to name all of them.
63	* ''Franchise/SuperSentai'' and ''Franchise/PowerRangers'' are in the [[MerchandiseDriven toy-sales business]], and one of their go-to themes is dinosaurs. (For the record, some others are animals, cars, and ninjas.) Notably, when there was a sales slump and they had to start moving merch fast, they used dinosaurs to do it (with ''Series/KishiryuSentaiRyusoulger'').
64	* ''Series/WalkingWithDinosaurs'':
65	** The original ''Walking With Dinosaurs'' line averts this as it is a serious and violent, age neutral speculative documentary series.
66	** ''Prehistoric Planet'' was a LighterAndSofter cut of the series aimed at children, but even then it didn't stray from showing how graphic nature can be.
67	** Played straight with the theatrical movie, ''Walking With Dinosaurs 3D''. Due to ExecutiveMeddling in order to get kids to "understand" it better, [[AnimalTalk voice-overs]] were added in at the last minute. The movie also contained a lot of kiddie humor. Due to the [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks backlash]], they released the ''Cretaceous Cut'' without the voice-overs.
68	** In the ''Walking with Dinosaurs Arena Spectacular'', the narration (performed by a person on-stage dressed as a 19th-century paleontologist) is more child-oriented than in the television series. It's also somewhat less overtly violent than the original documentary, though that's partially due to the limitations of the animatronics.
69	[[/folder]]
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71	[[folder:Podcasts]]
72	* Discussed in this [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knWCsonQVG4 podcast]] staring paleontologists. Dinosaurs are easy to market to kids, however adults aren't that interested in them. This is why there have been fewer dinosaur (or, even paleontology period) documentaries since the mid-2000s.
73	[[/folder]]
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75	[[folder:Video Games]]
76	* In the InteractiveFiction game ''VideoGame/AdVerbum'', one of the puzzles requires the player to win a contest of dinosaur knowledge against a young boy; the boy knows so many dinosaur names that the player can only win by cheating and making up fake dinosaur names.
77	* ''VideoGame/DinosaurKing'' is a video game series and shonen anime where dinosaurs are essentially {{Mon}}s. In the anime, they're trading cards that the protagonists need to find.
78	* Besides music, Richard in ''VideoGame/GrowingUp'' shows enthusiasm in dinosaurs as a kid, and ''[[ShowWithinAShow Dino World]]'' is his favorite movie series. His love for dinos doesn't fade away even in adulthood since he makes a soundtrack inspired by his favorite dino movie if you marry him.
79	* ''VideoGame/InazumaEleven'': Nishizono Shinsuke from the ''GO'' trilogy is a bit older than most examples, being a first-year in middle school, although [[OlderThanTheyLook he really doesn't look like one]]. The second game of the trilogy reveals he's a big fan of dinosaurs and he's excited to see them when Raimon travels to the Mezozoic Era.
80	* In ''VideoGame/LoveAndPies'', Amelia's kid daughter Kate always wears a dinosaur costume and is sometimes seen playing with her toy T-rex at the café.
81	* ''VideoGame/MaxAnAutisticJourney'': The game's protagonist, an autistic boy named Max, loves all sorts of animals and monsters, but seems to love dinosaurs the most. In addition to his multiple other dinosaur toys, his favorite toy and imaginary friend is a NotZilla called the "[[ShoutOut King of Monsters]]."
82	* In ''VideoGame/MassEffect2,'' Grunt, a genetically-engineered alien soldier who ReallyWasBornYesterday and who has a personality likened to that of a pubescent to teenaged boy, discovers Earth's dinosaurs while [[WikiWalk clicking on random links on the extranet]] and becomes completely entranced. Naturally, T-rex becomes his favorite. [[HiddenDepths He also discovers Earth novels in a similar fashion, and seems to especially like Hemingway.]]
83	* In ''[[VideoGame/PuttPutt Putt-Putt Travels Through Time]]'', the titular kid-aged convertible expresses his fascination with dinosaurs when he ends up in their era.
84	* In ''VideoGame/StickyBusiness'', David is a prepubescent kid who loves dinosaur stickers, and his father Marc asks you to make some for him when he first discovers your online sticker shop.
85	[[/folder]]
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87	[[folder:Visual Novels]]
88	* Misuzu Kamio from ''VisualNovel/{{AIR}}'' is a teenager, but she's been fascinated with dinosaurs since she was a child; she used to think bird's eggs were dinosaur's eggs [[note]][[https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-dinosaurs-shrank-and-became-birds/ which is not exactly false]][[/note]] and that chicks would eventually grow into dinosaurs. Her love of dinosaurs and her VerbalTic of saying the pseudo-dinosauric sound effect "gao" when she's troubled emphasize her childish personality.
89	[[/folder]]
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91	[[folder:Webcomics]]
92	* In ''Webcomic/GunnerkriggCourt'', when Annie finds out that a certain character is a TimeAbyss, she excitedly asks them what dinosaurs looked like.
93	* The alt-text for ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}'' [[https://xkcd.com/2273/ #2273]] gives a NinjaPirateZombieRobot take:
94	-->"See also: Farm animals and dinosaurs. I am so confident that there exists children's media that involves dinosaurs driving trucks on a farm that I'm writing this without even Googling to check."
95	* In ''Webcomic/SchlockMercenary'', Sorlie gets to meet ''actual'' dinosaurs, [[https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2019-09-02 with the appropriate reaction]].
96	* A Patreon-only strip of ''WebComic/DumbingOfAge'' revealed Dina's love of dinosaurs started at a young age, as about the time she started kindergarten, she also had her first trip to Dino Park...and right next to a picture commemorating it is her first itemized list of all the inaccuracies of Dino Park. Another strip showed Walky and Sal also had the dinosaur-loving phase, and Sal's able to bond with Dina because she had an answer for 'favorite dinosaur' that wasn't any of the usual suspects.
97	--->'''Dina:''' Favorite dinosaur?\
98	'''Sal:''' Pachycephalosaurus.\
99	'''Dina:''' [in awe] ''You may come in.''
100	[[/folder]]
101
102	[[folder:Web Videos]]
103	* Bowser Junior from ''WebVideo/SuperMarioLogan'' likes to play with dinosaurs. Sometimes when he plays dinosaurs with his friends, he will give them one tiny dinosaur to pit against his many bigger ones.
104	[[/folder]]
105
106	[[folder:Western Animation]]
107	* ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'':
108	** Buster really likes dinosaurs, as established in "Buster's Dino Dilemma".
109	** Bud likes dinosaurs as well and has a toy ''T. rex'' named Rapty, who is also his imaginary friend.
110	* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales2017'':
111	** Webby has "high-five a ''Brontosaurus''" as one of her life goals.
112	** In "Timephoon!", Dewey and Webby eagerly watch Bubba (himself a kid cave-duck) ride on a ''Triceratops'', and eventually Huey admits it's awesome.
113	* ''WesternAnimation/HarryAndHisBucketFullOfDinosaurs'' is about Harry, a five year old who has six miniature dinosaurs as his friends packed into a bucket. There's also a second child, Charley, who also has her own selection of dinosaur friends.
114	* The sixth episode of ''WesternAnimation/JohnnyBravo'' is "Johnny Meets Farrah Fawcett." Johnny succeeds in getting past Farrah's ruthless bodyguard by posing as Smarmy The Dinosaur. He's immediately mobbed by excited children, who use his supine form as a trampoline while Farrah blithely departs.
115	* In ''WesternAnimation/TheLoudHouse'', there's a [[Series/BarneyAndFriends Barney]] parody called Blarney, who is loved by the younger girls such as Lily and the twins, and also Clyde (who's eleven, but too much of a wuss to watch the scary movies).
116	* ''WesternAnimation/MollyOfDenali'': It is shown in "Going Toe to Toe with a Dinosaur" that Vera loves dinosaurs, and wants to be a paleontologist when she grows up.
117	* In ''WesternAnimation/MuppetBabies2018'', Kermit's [[CompanionCube favorite toy]] is his [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot Mega Super Ultra Robo Dinosaur]] action figure. In "A Very Muppet Babies Christmas", he hopes to get a pack of Mega Super Ultra Robo Dinosaur trading cards. In "When You Wish Upon a Rizzo", when Rizzo takes on the form of a genie and gives the babies each one wish, Kermit's wish is for his Mega Super Ultra Robo Dinosaur action figure to be life-sized.
118	* In ''WesternAnimation/PeppaPig'', George, one of the youngest characters, is a big dinosaur fan and owns a toy dinosaur named Mr. Dinosaur.
119	* ''WesternAnimation/RosiesRules'': Iggy likes playing dinosaurs, and has a dinosaur scooter helmet.
120	* In ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'', the babies love the cartoon dinosaur named Reptar. They watch him on TV, eat cereal and candy related to him, play with toys of him, etc.
121	* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': In "The Book Job", the Simpsons attend a live show called Sitting with Dinosaurs (a blatant parody of the ''Series/WalkingWithDinosaurs'' Arena Spectacular). The kids in the audience are excited to see the (fake) dinosaurs, but are frightened when they see that they're nothing like Barney.
122	-->'''Milhouse:''' These aren't dinosaurs! Dinosaurs sing!
123	* ''WesternAnimation/TimothyGoesToSchool'': This gets inverted in "Scary Monsters" in which Nora is scared of dinosaurs since she thought all of them were huge.
124	* At one point in ''WesternAnimation/WinstonsPottyChair'', Winston has an ImagineSpot where he is in a prehistoric forest when he reads a book about dinosaurs. This ultimately leads to Winston having a [[PottyFailure potty accident]], and when his dad sees him, he says, "Winston, that must be a good book! You forgot to go to the potty!"
125	[[/folder]]
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Context Main / KidsLoveDinosaurs